The Ascent towards Supermind, Part II, Chapter XXVI - The Ascent towards Supermind 203

So this Shakti is an expressive movement of what is already possessed and which is in the state of fullness. Ishawara is fullness, is a Master, there is nothing that is lacking in him, therefore there is no movement of possessing something from outside. For Ishwara nothing is outside. Normally, when you do not want to possess anything, you don’t act. Therefore, very often when people feel that when you are already full, you cease to act but this is a new possibility that when you are full; even then activity is possible. Not because you want something but you can express. It’s an expressive movement, not that without expressing you remain incomplete that also is not the case but also by expressing you don’t become incomplete. This is a new possibility, which arises, − the possibility of expressing all the qualities of Ishwara. Ishwara is called anantagunah, he has infinite qualities sattva, rajas and tamas are only three very minor qualities, which are in Prakriti. When you take Vishnu Sahasranama, all the sahasranama, every one of them is a quality and none of them is sattva, rajas and tamas. It is anantagunah of eshwaraya, Ishwara is anantaguna and this anatagunas is expressed, therefore Shakti also becomes anatagunah. So you discover this Shakti moving, you discover that all that you see in the world is of course sattvic, rajasic and tamasic. But, you also begin to perceive something behind it, above it, as if this Prakriti was simply a minor movement and above that movement there is a huge power, a great dynamo of activity which is everywhere, it is omnipresent, which can do everything which is omnipotent, which knows everything, which is omniscient. So, omnipotent, omnipresent and omniscient power is the Shakti.

You further discover at this point that in the perception of this huge Shakti, egoism is dissolved because there is no standing ground. Ego always feels I am independent and I am doing. When you really perceive that all action is proceeding from there, you are nothing what are you, where is your independence and what is your doership? So in the perception of it ego is dissolved, but you discover that beyond egoism you are also a true individual, this is another benefit of this experience. In the experience of Purusha as a witness, or Purusha as anumanta or in the experience of the Brahman, you don’t have the experience of yourself as an individual beyond ego. In these three experiences, you simply find that ego is dissolved and what remains is Purusha, as a witness or a Purusha, as anumanta or self, which immobile. But in this experience of Ishwara and the movement of Shakti, you find that there is something like you your own individuality, not egoistic and yet it is individual. This individual is what has been called Jivatman, not atman but Jivatman. Atman is the immobile Brahman but this Jivatman is the individual centration.

This centration has two aspects – aspects of being and aspect of movement within itself. In the case of Purusha consciousness Prakriti was outside, movement was outside, Purusha was only a witness but in this Jivatman, being and movement are in the same consciousness and you find that the being is centration of Ishwara and the nature is constituted by Shakti. Both of them together in the individual, – so you might say that the individual is a child of Shiva-Shakti. Shiva concentrates and gives the being to the individual. Prakriti gives the nature to it but that nature is not sattvic, rajasic or tamasic – it consists of the anantguna that nature which an individual now comes to possess, or comes to see, − is constituted by Shakti. That is why this true individual is called the child of the Lord and the Divine Mother. Every one of us is basically is a child of that.

All our sense of oneself, which till now was thought to be an ego, which now is dissolved, is now recovered as a real individual but unegoistic. It does not have that false notion that it exists independently. It does not experience that it is the doer of things. It recognizes itself as a centration of the Supreme, who is found to be a vehicle of the Supreme Lord and the Divine Mother. It’s only a vehicle. It’s a special kind of a centration. Its specialty is only this that it has a specific swabhava, it has the specific function in the totality. Very often we ask the question that what is my specific work in the world. In fact every individual has this basic question, what is my specific work in the world? This question is answered at this point. If you don’t have this experience, you cannot answer this question, because it is only here by knowing the movement, the specificity of that movement, the movement is ananta – infinite ocean but in that infinite ocean, there is special kind of colour which belongs to you, which makes you what you are. You are not separated from the others. Just as the seven colours of rainbow are not separated from each other, it’s basically one and yet each strap is distinguished from the others. So, each one of us is distinguishable from the others but not divided from the others. And although distinguishable from the others, it is indivisibly one with all others. It has also a possibility of experiencing any individuality other than its own. In the egoistic consciousness, the divisibility is so great that to identify yourself with others becomes extremely difficult. Division is the most important element in the egoistic consciousness. But here all doors are opened, you can experience any individual’s experience as his own experience, the universality, sympathy, interpenetration of one in the other, the other in one, these experiences are of the true individual, the true individual, as a child of the Supreme Lord and Divine mother, individual experiencing itself as a vehicle of the movement of Supreme Lord and the Divine Mother. The individual experiencing its own specificity, distinguishable from others but not divided from the others. And the experience of the individual, who can interchange with all others freely, – these are the experiences of the Jivatman and all these experiences are possible.